However, a new bill by the New Jersey Assembly Consumer Affairs Committee would allow Tesla to resume its direct cars sales in the state. The bipartisan committee voted 4-0 to give Tesla a reprieve as long as the company follows a few simple rules. Tesla would be limited to just four stores in the state (for now) and would be required to have at least one facility to service Tesla vehicles.

“New Jersey prides itself as being pro-business, pro-innovative and pro-jobs. And this is a company that is an American company, an American idea,” said bill sponsor Tim Eustace (D-Bergen). “I think we would be mistaken if we didn’t’ reverse the idea that the MVC made, making it illegal to sell Teslas in New Jersey.”

Tesla Model S

Tesla CEO Musk has long rallied against the dealership model and says that these “middlemen” don’t have customers’ best interests in mind. Musk points to the fact that dealerships make a large portion of their profits from vehicle services (repairs, routine maintenance, etc.), but electric vehicles like the Model S require far less maintenance than conventional automobiles, lessening the need for middlemen.

This latest move by New Jersey comes after Musk lashed out at Governor Chris Christie, stating, “Anyone who has been through the conventional auto dealer purchase process knows, consumer protection is pretty much the furthest thing from the typical car dealer’s mind.” Musk even invoked “Bridgegate” by stating that if selling through dealerships ensures “consumer protection”, then “Gov. Christie has a bridge closure he wants to sell you.”

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

More recently a number of directors for the Federal Trade Commission have come out in direct support for Tesla’s direct sales model in two separateblog postings. The FTC noted that the market should determine if a direct sales model is beneficial to customers. “Our point has not been that new methods of sale are necessarily superior to the traditional methods—just that the determination should be made through the competitive process,” said the FTC directors in an April blog posting.

“We hope lawmakers will recognize efforts by auto dealers and others to bar new sources of competition for what they are—expressions of a lack of confidence in the competitive process that can only make consumers worse off.”

quote: it's such a huge hassle when the salesmen/women swarm like vultures the moment you step on the lot

This is exactly why the arguments about direct sales vs dealership sales is more or less nit picking. Whether it is direct sales or dealership sales you still have some sort of retail premises that has to be paid for, staff who expect to be paid, the poor paying customers have to be chased, the advertising has to be bought, in warranty cars have to be fixed, city council taxes and government taxes have to be paid (you can tell I'm not an American), etc.At the end of the day, Tesla need to make a profit from the cars they make, and the crux here isn't which sales model they use, but whether that model makes a profit for them. I don't think the sales model they want will be very much more successful than the sales model they rejected.